Albert Szent-Gyorgy, who discovered Vitamin C, said:

‘Genius is seeing what everyone else sees and thinking what no-one else has thought.’

If you can identify the standard viewpoint then survey the situation from a different viewpoint you have an excellent chance of gaining a new insight. When Jonas Salk was asked how he invented the vaccine for polio he replied, ‘I imagined myself as a cancer cell and tried to sense what it would be like.’

Ford Motor Corporation asked Edward de Bono, who originated the concept of lateral thinking, for some advice on how they could clearly differentiate themselves from their many competitors in car manufacturing. De Bono gave them a very innovative idea. Ford had approached the problem of competing from the point of view of a car manufacturer and asked the question, “How can we make our cars more attractive to consumers?”

De Bono approached the problem from another direction and asked the question, “How can we make the whole driving experience better for Ford customers?” His advice was that Ford should buy up car parks in all the major city centers and make them available for Ford cars only. His remarkable idea was too radical for Ford who saw themselves as an automobile manufacturer with no interest in the car parks business.

In 1954 the British Government held an auction for commercial television regions. Many companies were interested in bidding for the franchises. They analysed the demographics of the regions to identify which were the wealthiest regions that would produce the most advertising revenues. The result was that they focused on London and the South-East of England.

Sydney Bernstein was Managing Director of a small chain of cinemas, Granada Cinemas. He wanted to compete in the auction. He told his people:

‘Don’t look for the richest region, look for the wettest. Find me the region with highest rainfall.’

This turned out to be the North-West of England. Granada bid for this and won it. Bernstein’s idea was that it was better to have a region where it rained so much that people stayed in and watched TV. He succeeded by approaching the problem from a different point of view. He thought what no-one else thought.

The spectators at the Olympic Games in Mexico City in 1968 were amazed to see a young athlete perform a high jump with his back to the bar. Until then, every high jumper ‘rolled’ over the bar with his or her face down. Dick Fosbury, an American, introduced an entirely new approach, the ‘flop’, leaping over with his back close to the bar and his face up.

Fosbury was ranked 48th in the world in 1967; yet in 1968 he caused a sensation when he won the Olympic Gold Medal with his unprecedented technique and a leap of 2.24metres. What he introduced was literally a leap of the imagination - and it revolutionized high jumping. Nowadays all the top jumpers use his method. He thought what no-one else thought and conceived a new method.

How can we force ourselves to take a different view of a situation?

Instead of looking at the scene from your view try looking at it from the perspective of a customer, a product, a supplier, a child, an alien, a lunatic, a comedian, a dictator, an anarchist, an architect, Salvador Dali, Leonardo da Vinci and so on. Challenge all the common assumptions. If everyone else is looking for the richest region, look for the wettest. If everyone else is facing the bar then turn your back on it.

The great geniuses did not take the traditional view and develop existing ideas. They took an entirely different view and transformed society.

Picasso took a different view of painting; he saw cubes, shapes and impressions instead of accurate images. Einstein imagined a new approach to physics; a world where time and space were relative. Darwin conceived a different view of the origin of species; he saw how they might have evolved rather than been created. Each of them looked at the world in a new way.

In similar fashion Jeff Bezos took a different view of book retailing with Amazon.com, Stelios took a new perspective on flying with Easyjet, Swatch transformed our view of watches and IKEA changed the way we buy furniture. If we can come at problems from entirely new directions then we can think of things that conventional thinkers miss.

It gives us unlimited possibilities for innovation.

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TOUGH QUIZ

1. Name the one sport in which neither the spectators nor the participants know the score or the leader until the contest ends.

2. What famous North American landmark is constantly moving backward?

3. Of all vegetables, only two can live to produce on their own for several growing seasons. All other vegetables must be replanted every year. What are the only two perennial vegetables?

4. What fruit has its seeds on the outside?

5. In many liquor stores you can buy pear brandy, with a real pear inside the bottle. The pear is

whole and ripe, and the bottle is genuine; it hasn’t been cut in any way. How did the pear get inside the bottle?

6. Only three words in standard English begin with the letters ‘dw’ and they are all common words. Name two of them.

7. There are 14 punctuation marks in English grammar. Can you name at least half of them?

8. Name the only vegetable or fruit that is never sold frozen, canned, processed,c ooked, or in any other form except fresh.

9. Name 6 or more things that you can wear on your feet beginning with the letter ‘S.’

10. What are the two most powerful words for a human being to say?

For the  TOUGH QUIZ answers please email at casey@caseycombden.com and I will send you the answers.

 Cheers Casey

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If we are given unlimited resources to solve a problem then we can always come up with something - and often it is expensive and over-engineered. When we have to use the limited set of resources contained in the problem and its immediate environment then we are forced to be more creative - and very often the result is a solution that is elegant, inexpensive and effective. Using the tunnel is a prime example.

When Hiram Maxim went pigeon shooting he noticed two problems. One was the strong recoil of the rifle into his shoulder. The second was that he had to stop to reload the gun. He wondered if it was possible to use one problem to solve the other and by doing so he invented the machine gun.

At the end of the first Gulf War fires were raging out of control in the Kuwaiti oil refineries. What could be used to put them out? One answer might have been sand. But a better solution was found. The pipelines that were normally used to pump oil from the refineries were used to pump water to the refineries. By using an existing resource and reversing the flow the problem was overcome.

Engineers are accustomed to working in very constrained conditions. In the very early Volkswagen Beetle car there was a problem of how to provide the power needed for the windscreen washer. The ingenious solution that the engineers came up with was to use the air pressure from the spare wheel (which was in the front of the car) to power the water jet.

But it is not just product engineers who can use internal resources in ingenious ways. In 2005 the IRA pulled off a major robbery at the Northern Bank in Belfast - they got away with £25m in banknotes. How could the authorities catch the criminals or stop them using the proceeds of their crime?

They came up with a clever idea using one of the resources within the problem - the stolen banknotes. They changed the currency in Northern Ireland and reprinted all bank notes. Anyone holding old bank notes had to bring them in to be changed - and that is a big problem if you are holding millions of stolen banknotes.

So how can you use this approach in your problem solving?

One of the methods taught in Systematic Inventive Thinking is to break the problem down into a chain of unwanted effects. Now consider in turn each element in the problem or its environment and say to yourself - this element can be adapted to stop one of the unwanted effects and to break the chain. Then come up with ideas.

By rigorously and imaginatively applying this technique you will often find an inventive solution.

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You must be in Joy first. And then your life will change into Joy.

Difficult times are the greatest opportunities in disguise. When we face difficult times we have to put in determined work to get ourselves into Joy. But let me tell you, when you can get yourself into Joy despite what is happening around you, your life must change - it’s the law!

In addition, as you become Joy in difficult times you are becoming the master of your emotions, the master of your life, and the master of the law of attraction. Difficult times are your greatest opportunity to practice yourself into Joy.

Of course if your life is going along swimmingly then it is very easy to be in Joy. During those times your Joy is most likely a reaction to the good times. But the magnificence and the power that you really have within you will be seen when you can be in Joy during difficult times. It is then that you will see the true power that you have within you, because as you hold to Joy, you will shift all the energies of the Universe, and your life and your world will change.

The cause of everything is within you, and the effect is what you experience in your life. You have the power within you to change everything by putting yourself in Joy. You can change everything so easily by becoming Joy first! And nothing can change until you get yourself in Joy, because that is the law of attraction. Like attracts like! The energy of Joy attracts energy of Joy!

Do whatever it takes to find your Joy, and then keep yourself in it no matter what. Keep ramping up your level of Joy every day. There is no limit to the levels of Joy you can reach. You will see change to the degree of Joy that you can attain and maintain. The higher the Joy you can create within you, the more spectacular the change, and the higher the Joy, the faster the change. Once you get yourself in Joy it is easy to maintain it, because your emanation of Joy attracts more Joy. The law of attraction will continually send you more feelings of Joy.

You cannot criticize or blame or complain when you are in Joy. You cannot be afraid when you are in Joy. You cannot speak negatively when you are in Joy. You cannot harm another when you are in Joy. Negativity cannot reach you when you are in Joy.

When you are in Joy you are compassionate. When you are in Joy you are considerate and caring. When you are in Joy you love others. When you are in Joy you appreciate everything. When you are in Joy you are in love with the world, and the Universe is in love with you.

Be in Joy. Seek it with all of your heart, and you will find it.

May the Joy be with you,  Rhonda Byrne

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Let’s say you want to lose weight or get in better shape, but you don’t have an hour a day to spend exercising in the gym. Therefore, you’ve pretty well resigned yourself to not losing weight or getting in shape. What if you had five minutes though…just about everyone can find five minutes to exercise, stretch, walk around the block or walk the dog. Would you be willing to be grateful for five minutes and make the best possible use of it? Therein lies the beginning of your perfect life!

Apply the same principle to anything in your life that you want to improve. Maybe your finances are a wreck and you think you need a financial makeover. Before you rush off to a financial planner, take a moment to practice being grateful for what you do have. Then ask how you can improve your finances starting now. Are you consistently “paying yourself first,” as any good financial planner will advise you to do? Even as little as $50 a month can quickly build a nest egg of thousands of dollars, through consistency and the “magic” of compound interest. It’s not the amount that matters, it’s the attitude and the action. Even something as small as cleaning out your wallet and practicing the attitude of gratitude when you sit down to pay bills can signal a shift in your financial picture.

The point is, you already have the life you have. The lessons you need to learn are right in front of you (and me!). The sooner you start accepting (rather than running from) the present, being grateful for what’s right in front of you, and taking positive action, the sooner you will radiate energy, optimism and the can-do spirit that makes you attractive to more and better opportunities.

A simple formula may help you remember how to apply this principle:

BEING PRESENT + AN ATTITUDE OF GRATITUDE + POSITIVE ACTION

= MY PERFECT LIFE

Try it for a day.

Each time you start dreaming about how perfect your life would be if…come back to this moment, give thanks for what is, and do one thing to perfect what you have and who you are right now. There’s a saying that “when the student is ready, the teacher appears.” If you’re ready to start perfecting your life, your teachers are all around you.

Are you looking?

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Even how you think about that is likely colored by past programming…which you can change.

Remember this: the Truth does not cause pain. If you have a belief or perception that causes you to feel hopeless, angry, sad, etc, those feelings are the clear indication that that belief or perception is off.

The Universe actually works…and with such an intricate, unerring order, that it’s almost unfathomable….governed by Truth (natural law). When you understand what is True, and think in ways that are true, your life will work with such an order.

“Ye shall know the Truth, and the Truth shall set you free.” Jesus

If someone comes to your door selling vacuums, you don’t have to buy. No matter how convincing their sales pitch. That’s your choice. When a pattern of thought comes knocking at your minds door, wanting to sell you a load of pain…no matter how buyable the pitch is, how many times you have bought in the past…you don’t have to go with it. (You may want to unsubscribe from their auto-ship program.)

You can remember that Truth empowers and misinformation (which misaligns you with the reality of Life) disempowers…and feeling the disempowerment of the thought, your clear understanding can recognize “that thought isn’t True. It only seems true because it matches my programming, but it actually isn’t. And as I don’t buy it, and instead refocus on a perspective that empowers me, I’ll have a better life and even the programming will change.”

If you claim the issues you get to keep them. Why do that? Your words have power and influence reality. Every word you speak has energy that blesses or hurts your life. So why speak words that aren’t a blessing to you. You don’t have to.

Pay attention to the patterns of predisposition that have been running you. The key is being conscious…the conscious direction of your life, your creative energy, for the life experience you actually want. Before acting, before speaking, even when thoughts come up…remember what you really want, take full responsibility for your life, and direct yourself accordingly.

You can witness your thoughts, your beliefs, your moods and emotions…which means you are not any of those things. You are the witness, which is also the chooser when you remember. Your sovereignty comes from existence itself “Made in the image and likeness of God…” Nothing has the power to take that away (though it can be forgotten).

When you are not conscious, clearly your consciousness, You, are not directing the show. So the patterns of the past play auto-pilot based on what they have learned (doing the best they can actually).

(Here is a tip: anytime you think, say, or do anything that is not in your highest good, there is some degree of unconsciousness at work.)

There are things you can control and things you can’t. Focusing on what you can’t control disempowers you. Consciously moving your attention to what you can control in every situation will empower you. Ask “what can I do about this?” and do it. Don’t blame yourself, don’t blame others, and don’t indulge negativities that won’t benefit you…just ask what you can do that is positive and do it. And go neutral to the rest (since that’s all you can do). This is a recipe for freedom.

When you become aware in a moment that you were being directed by an old pattern (worrying, judging, despairing, etc), be glad that your realized it—now you can shift. If frustration, self-judgment, impatience come up, i.e. “Why am I still doing that, I know better…am I ever going to get it?”…realize that is just another layer of patterning and don’t indulge it. It won’t help. Just recognize that patterning was established over time and it may require some time and consistency to shift…be glad that you recognized it, and simply shift. No drama needed.

Right now, reading these words, there may even be a pattern coming up saying “I can’t do that, its too hard…its not that simple…I don’t have the energy, etc”. That also, is just a pattern, programmed in the past, not even by you. It’s ok that it comes up. Just recognize it as a programmed reaction…you can even anticipate when it will likely come up…but recognize that it’s ultimately not true, and don’t buy into it. And redirect your thinking and perceiving in a manner that better produces what you want. That’s all. It’s actually simple.

Easy and hard are states of mind about energy application. All shifts require energy application. That does not have to be subjectively related to as hard. Calling what needs to be done hard, is just another unconscious pattern of thought that will not benefit you. “See the job, do the job, and stay out of the misery.” Maharishi

And enjoy your life. It’s a beautiful gift. Attune your awareness to the beauty of life.

What you put your attention on grows.

Blessings

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